With third-quarter sales sluggish and its share of the domestic market down a lot of percentage points, Ford of Dagenham have unveiled a great new contest to spur on purchasees of their cars.
The new Ford Instant-Win Airbag Game has been launched. The new airbags, which award fabulous prizes upon high-speed impact with another car or stationary object, will come as standard in all of the company's 2009 cars.
"Car accidents have never been so exciting," said Ford vice-president of marketing Rusty Fee-At, who expects the contest to boost 2009 sales significantly. "When you play the new Ford Instant Win Airbag Game, your next fatal collision could mean a trip for two to to the World Cup, or a year's worth of free Esso Unleaded."
Though it does not officially begin until 1 October 2008, the airbag promotion has already been tested in select cities, with feedback overwhelmingly positive.
"As soon as my car started to skid out of control, I thought to myself, oh boy, this could be it, I could be a big winner!'" said Cambridge's Bernard Lout, who lost his wife but won £50 on Sunday when the Focus they were driving hit an oil slick at 60 mph and slammed into an oncoming truck.
"When the car stopped rolling down the embankment, I knew Ellen was dead, but all I could think about was getting the blood and glass out of my eyes so I could read that airbag prize!"
"It's really addictive," said Aberdeen resident Peter MacNoods, speaking from his hospital bed where he is listed in critical condition with severe brain haemorrhaging and a punctured right lung. "I've already crashed four cars trying to win those World Cup tickets, but I still haven't won. I swear, I'm going to win those tickets, even if it kills me!"
MacNoods said that as soon as he is well enough, he plans to buy a new Mondeo and drive it into a tree.
Ford officials are not surprised the airbag contest has been so well received. "In the past, nobody really liked car crashes, and that's understandable. After all, they're scary and dangerous and, sometimes, even fatal," Ford CEO John Paul Ford IV said. "But now, when you drive a new Ford car or Iveco truck, your next serious crash could mean serious cash. Who wouldn't like that?"
Ford added that in the event a motorist wins a prize but is killed, that prize will be awarded to the next of kin.
According to Ford's official contest rules, odds of winning the grand prize, a brand-new 2009 Mondeo S24, are 1 in 43,000,000. Statistical experts,however, say the real chances of winning are significantly worse. "If you factor in the odds of getting in a serious car accident in the first place,approximately 1 in 720,000 - the actual odds of winning a prize each time you step in your car are more like 1 in 31 trillion."
Furthermore, even if one is in an accident, there is no guarantee the airbag will inflate. "I was recently broadsided by a drunk driver in my new Galaxy," said Cardiff resident Dick Yaknasty.
"My car was totalled, and because it was the side of my car that got hit, my airbag didn't even inflate. But what really gets me is the fact that the drunk driver, who rammed my side with the front of his 1997 Explorer, won a £100 gift certificate from an old competition that was never run in the first place. That's just wrong and not what I spend twenty grand on a car for."
